31 Days of Autumn Nesting: Day 14 – The Exercise Room

I finally tackled a long-postponed task today. Our exercise room has been a dumping ground ever since our Happyland Music Festival back in May. Actually, that’s not entirely true. I *did* have it sort of straightened up at one time – at least enough that I could get in there to use the exercise equipment. But over time we’ve riffled through stuff trying to find certain things that had been left behind, the kids and friends have slept in there, stuff I would ordinarily put away in the closet has been left out (because I couldn’t easily open the closet doors with all the junk!), and, well, one thing led to another. This is what greeted me today behind the closed door:

And this:

Until folks claim their stuff the best I could do was box it up and stack it out of the way. But at least I can get in there to exercise and it’s not such a wreck that I can’t stand to be in there. See that nice treadmill there? We are going to get reacquainted.

I’d like to think those boxes will get sorted out to their rightful owners but the truth is, we will probably still have all of it here when the next Happyland Music Fest rolls around. I was thinking today that if I decide for sure that I am not going to get chickens again, I might turn their coop (which was originally a metal storage building) into storage for Happyland stuff. Chances are that won’t happen anytime soon but if I do some major clearing out and organizing of our huge storage closet, I can move all this stuff in there. Ultimately I want to put all my crafting stuff in here and use that drafting table for my projects.

And maybe the weight machine will see some action now:

The stool and speaker are high on my list of items for whom I’d like to find the owners:

So that was my autumn project of the day. As the days grow shorter I tend to struggle a bit with a less than cheery mood sometimes. It’s nothing as serious as depression but I’d say it’s at least a mild from of Seasonal Affective Disorder. My plan to combat it this winter is to buy a special light made for people with SAD and use it while on the treadmill. The combination of light and exercise are supposed to be really helpful.

Comments

I have an idea (if it'll work for you) on returning stuff back to its rightful owner: how about sending out a mass email to everyone that was at Happyland and telling them that if they left anything behind and they don't pick it up by _____ (pick a date), it will be donated.

I like your idea about donating unclaimed items and I may very well do that after the next one for anything that is still left behind. Part of the problem is that a lot of the attendees live out of town or out of state so I know it's not easy for them to just run by and pick up their stuff.